Free spirit Jessica Biel

In her latest film, Easy Virtue, Jessica Biel plays Larita, a feisty American divorcee who is seen as a “gold digger from the land of opportunists.” While her co-stars in this frothy British period piece didn’t see her in that light, the 27-year-old American actress says that she could relate to her character’s struggle to blend in with a well-heeled, upper-crust world. “I felt like a fish out of water, but it was so helpful,” says Biel, who enjoyed a middle-class upbringing in Boulder, Colo. “We just kind of exploited that. Anytime I was feeling uncomfortable or starting to get out of my comfort zone, the director rolled the cameras!”

The film, which opens this month, is set in the late 1920s and based on a social comedy by Noel Coward that pokes fun at snooty English high society and, at a deeper social level, exposes how American entrepreneurial zeal was overshadowing Britain’s imperialism. Larita, who is a race-car driver, represents the brave new world crashing into the old when she marries British aristocrat John Whittaker (Ben Barnes). When the pair arrive at the Whittaker family pile, John’s father (Colin Firth) is charmed by Larita’s spirited ways, but his mother (Kristin Scott Thomas) is horrified. In witty dialogue typical of Coward, it’s not long before the two women spark. “Is it true that you’ve had as many lovers as they say?” inquires the icy matriarch. “Of course it’s not true,” replies Larita. “Hardly any of them actually loved me.” But the cast did. “Obviously, it was a very difficult thing for me to have to be in love with her — Jessica Biel,” says Barnes, tongue firmly in cheek. “Somebody had to do it. I’m just upset that it was me!”

For Biel — who’s most known for her performances in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Illusionist and I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry — starring in Easy Virtue was a career-enhancing move. “It was exactly what I was looking for, something I could throw myself into where everyone is expecting me to fail,” Biel told the British press. “Internally, I knew I could do it. That’s the joy of this business: shaking it up — surprising myself, surprising everybody else — otherwise, people just put you in a box.” So far, the critics have been generous in their praise for her performance in this film. “Biel is one of the great, beautiful babes of her generation,” writes Variety’s Todd McCarthy. “But if her abilities as a spirited, sharp-witted comedienne with a smart sense of timing had not frequently been demonstrated, it’s only because she had seldom been asked to display them.”

'Anytime I was feeling uncomfortable or starting to get out of my comfort zone, the director rolled the cameras!' says Jessica Biel.

Stephan Elliott — the film’s director — wrote the screenplay with Sheridan Jobbins, but the film’s tone captures Coward’s signature languid bons mots and deliciously sly innuendos. “You can’t find anything better than Coward’s writing,” says Biel. “There is so much pressure to deliver your lines with the right speed, venom and wit — and all with a smile! It’s an incredible challenge.”